IntercontinentalExchange, Inc. (ICE) reported its third quarter results yesterday.

The company swung to a GAAP net income of $86.9 million or $1.18 per share from a net income of $75 million or $1.04 in the year-ago period. Results came in 3 cents ahead of the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1.15.

The quarterly results benefited from position limitations on speculators, sweeping regulatory reforms, lower expenses and record futures trading. The upside was also attributable to growth in the company’s core businesses, significant progress from new initiatives and stronger margins.

The company could benefit as more over-the-counter contracts are exchange-traded and cleared, but could suffer if U.S. regulators impose new commodity-market position limits.

Net revenues increased 27.2% year over year to $256.3 million. The growth was primarily attributable to 34% increase in consolidated transaction and clearing fee revenues in the quarter driven primarily by new products, strong trading volumes in ICE's futures and OTC energy segments, continued

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Amsterdam and Peroff have a new white paper discussing the case of opposition leader Dr. Chee Soon Juan in Singapore. The introduction of the executive summary of the report is below, followed by a link for downloading the full paper.

Introduction

This White Paper documents the repression of political freedoms in Singapore. It reviews how the Government of Singapore, under the leadership of the People's Action Party (PAP), has monopolized the state's apparatus to its own benefit. The result has been the denial of democratic rights and freedoms and the muzzling of domestic and international media.

The case of Dr Chee Soon Juan is examined in detail. Being the leader of one of Singapore's most important opposition parties - the Singapore Democratic Party (SDP)

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Dubai’s government returned to the open bond market upon a growing sense that the notoriously ‘profligate’ emirate–as at least one analyst has previously criticized it in comparison to its more steady, oil-fueled sibling Abu Dhabi–can be trusted not to default on its $80bn or so of outstanding debt. On the heels of last week’s proposed Euro Medium-Term Note (EMTN) program which seeks to raise 6.5bn, divided into four billion dollars in EMTN and 2.5-bn in Islamic bond issue, or sukuk, the government on Wednesday successfully placed nearly $2 billion in new five-year Islamic bonds–divided into both a dollar and dirham tranche–the biggest sukuk sale from the Gulf region this year. Pricing was set at 375 basis points plus/minus 10 points over mid-swaps for the dollar tranche, and with the same spread over three-
month Emirates Interbank Offered Rate, or EIBOR, used for the
 dirham

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A new ETF giving access to Chinese A shares is to be launched in Singapore next month.

The United FTSE Xinhua China A50 ETF, to be offered by the asset management subsidiary of United Overseas Bank (UOB), will be the first China A-shares fund to be denominated and traded in Singapore dollars.

Chinese A shares are denominated and traded in Chinese yuan and listed on the Shanghai or Shenzhen stock exchanges. Historically, access to the A-shares market in China has been limited to Chinese nationals and qualified foreign institutional investors (QFIIs) approved by the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC).

The FTSE Xinhua China A50 Index is designed to measure the performance of the 50 largest China A-shares companies, based on market capitalization.

ETFs tracking A shares are already dominant in the Asian market. The Hong Kong-listed iShares Asia Trust, which also tracks the FTSE Xinhua A50 Index, is the largest Asian ETF, with $6.7

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STB hopes to attract more high net worth individuals to Singapore SINGAPORE: The tourism stakes are high and Singapore is trying to woo more visitors. It is betting on the two integrated resorts due to open next year, and also spinning for a more diverse crowd. The Singapore Tourism Board (STB) said that it is on track to meeting its target of attracting 9 to 9.5 million visitors to the city this year. Despite the economic downturn, 6.2 million tourists visited Singapore in the first 8 months of this year. STB’s strategy ahead is to woo more high net worth individuals, or those with at least a million US dollars to invest. “Singapore is limited by its size and capacity and therefore, in that case, we need to make sure that we attract the right kind of audience,” said Chew Tiong Heng, director, Destination Marketing, Singapore Tourism Board. “While we will not neglect people with ...

Micro Imaging Technology, Inc. announced today that Biotek Sdn Bhd has purchased its first MIT 1000 System. Biotek Sdn Bhd was recently signed as the company’s distributor for Malaysia and other Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) which includes Indonesia, Singapore, The Philippines, Thailand and Cambodia, in addition to others.

Recognized as a premier distributor in the food protection market, Biotek distributes products that are complementary to the MIT 1000 Rapid Microbial Identification System. “Our sales strategy is to demonstrate the features and benefits of this System in typical applications, enabling prospective clients to immediately understand its value. We have found this approach produces much faster sales than other traditional methods,” commented Biotek’s Director, W.C. Fong. “We are pleased to add the MIT 1000 System to our product portfolio. Its rapid test time coupled with its low operating cost will be attractive to many of our customers.”

Biotek has been scheduled

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• Goldman Sachs (NYSE:GS) reported third quarter earnings of $5.25 a share, versus Zacks estimates of $4.14 a share, as revenues rose to $12.37 billion from $11.02 billion

• Citigroup (NYSE:C) reported a 27 cent per share loss for the quarter, inline with Zacks estimates, on revenues of $20.4 billion

• Baxter International (NYSE:BAX) reported third quarter earnings of 98 cents a share, one cent above Zacks estimates, on revenues of $3.15 billion

• Research in Motion (NASDAQ:RIMM) is due to launch its new version of a touchscreen Blackberry, the Storm2 today

• Singapore's Oversea-Chinese Banking Group agreed to pay ING Group (NYSE:ING) $1.46 billion for its private banking operations in Asia

• According to Gartner data Acer overtook Dell (NASDAQ:DELL) as the number 2 PC computer brand by market share, with 15.4% of the global market, versus Dell's 12.8% and Hewlett-Packard's (NYSE:HPQ) 20%

• Anheuser-Busch InBev (NYSE:BUD) passed its $7 billion divestment goal to help repay its $52 billion Anheuser-Busch takeover, agreeing

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Peabody Energy Corp. (BTU) has recently opened an office in Jakarta, Indonesia, to expand business development and coal sourcing opportunities in India, China and other fast-growing Asian markets.  Indonesia is the world's largest source of export thermal coal and the Pacific markets are driving global demand for coal. The company expects these markets to achieve 5% to 10% compound annual growth over the next five or more years. For instance, India is world’s fastest-growing coal importer and is expected to be short by about 200 million tons of coal in the next five years. Also, China - the world’s largest coal consumer - has been importing coal at a record pace in 2009.  Peabody’s Jakarta office will be run by Reynard Hanoppo, a former sales manager for coal producer PT Kideco Jaya Agung. Hanoppo will report to Phillip Smith, the managing director of Asian trading. ...

The Trade Deficit decreased to $30.7 billion in August from $31.9 billion in July.  August exports increased by $0.2 billion to $128.2 billion, offset by the increase in imports by $0.9 billion to $158.9 billion.  The Commerce Department provided the August figures of the trade balance of the U.S. relative to selected trading partners, in billions of dollars, with surpluses in Hong Kong ($1.3), Australia ($1.2), Egypt ($0.4), and Singapore ($0.3).  Deficits were recorded, in billions of dollars, with China ($20.2), OPEC ($6.4),the European Union ($5.4), Japan ($4.3), Mexico ($4.0), Venezuela ($1.9), Nigeria ($1.7), Canada ($1.5), Taiwan ($0.5), and Korea ($0.4).

Upcoming Releases Treasury Budget (10/13 at 2:00 PM EST) Retail Sales (10/14 at 8:30 A MEST) Business Inventories (10/14 at 10:00 AM EST) FOMC Minutes (10/14 at 2:14 PM EST)

Zacks Investment Research

Its almost comical to see the big banks coming out of the woodwork with their opinions on how high gold is going to go now. If you are a trader (I am not) maybe that means its time for a little pullback. Certainly is alot of confidence oozing from this article. Gold, ‘Off The Charts’, May Target $1,500: Technical Analysis By Glenys Sim Oct. 7 (Bloomberg) — Investors should hold onto long positions in gold as bullion has “significant upside potential” to reach as high as $1,500 an ounce, Barclays Capital said, citing trading patterns. “Having rallied ‘off the charts’, we are left to resort to projections and extrapolated trendlines to forecast where the move might stop,” Jordan Kotick, global head of technical analysis at Barclays Capital, wrote in a note e-mailed today. So-called trendlines are used to determine momentum and are found ...